A HOUSE OF ILLUSIONS.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXII, Issue 129, 1 June 1901, Page 2 (Supplement)

A HOUSE OF ILLUSIONS.

A house specially designed for the production of- optical illusions has just been patented in America by an English inventor named Kotin. It is built upside down, to beg-in with, resting- upon its chimneys. When one enters it he finds himself in the midst of such a remarkable arrangement of eye deception that even the most well-balanced person mentally is sure to find himself thoroughly at odds with f|s own understanding. Much of the mischief depends "upon curious arrangements of mirrors. One floor, for example, is of glass, beneath which are two mirrors so placed as to reflect the sky and cause the visitor to imagine that the sky is beneath him, and that he is walking on his head. Entering- from, below—i.e., in the tipper part of the inverted building—he actually ascends a series of staircases, but while doing so he seems all the time to be descending. Furthermore, some of the rooms are so fixed that other people in them appear to be sitting on the ceiling.

The corridors or passages of this remarkable house are six-sided and walled with mirrors, affording some very curious optical effects, and the floor of one room is placed on springs in such a way as to sway and totter when one enters it, thus conveying to the visitor a sense of insecurity that might perhaps be painful to the timid. Nothing quite so odd as this building of illusions has thtis far been seen, and it is to be expected that before long- persons who enjoy that sort of thing will have an opportunity to wander through such houses, for a small admission fee, at the summer resorts.